


Safe and Sound

by sgtbucketbarnes



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Baker Bucky, F/M, Kidnapping, Protective Bucky, mentioned bullet wounds, mobster steve, mostly fluff tho, nothing graphic tho I promise, slight angst, undercover cop Bucky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-23 20:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17087582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sgtbucketbarnes/pseuds/sgtbucketbarnes
Summary: Bucky is an undercover agent who hires a sweet girl to work the front counter at the bakery that serves as a front for smuggling and trade deals.





	Safe and Sound

**Author's Note:**

> I accidentally wrote two prompts in one fic and I refuse to change it so I present my work for hollandroos and irndad (on tumblr) writing challenges! I’ve never written anything close to angst so please don’t expect much in that area.
> 
> Prompts: “I almost lost you” kiss, and “Nobody and nothing can hurt you anymore.”

“Uh, Bucky? There’s a girl here asking about a job application?”

Bucky looked up from his laptop with his brows furrowed, up at Sam leaning into his office from the doorway. “Job application?”

“Yeah something about an ad in the paper for a starting position at the bakery,” Sam replied, looking just as confused as Bucky.

They hadn’t put an ad in the paper in more than a year. Seemed odd someone would come asking about it now. Maybe it was an agent trying to get into contact with him? They were usually more subtle than this.

Nevertheless, he decided it was something he should handle. He didn’t want anyone else seeing this girl’s face if it did happen to be an agent.

Closing the lid to his laptop and standing from his comfortable office chair, he took a deep sigh. He rounded his desk and clapped Sam on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it. You stay here and prop your feet up,” Bucky teased with a small grin. Sam just rolled his eyes and plopped down into one of the old lumpy chairs in his office, happy to have a break from manning the front.

“How can I help you?” Bucky greeted, stepping behind the counter. He eyed the girl standing in the middle of the bakery’s small dining area. She was distracted by the photographs scattered across the far right wall, newspaper folded, her hands twisting around it. He guesses it’s a nervous habit.

Her head snaps around at his voice, hair swishing over her shoulders, eyes a little wide with… intimidation? He huffs a little laugh at her expression, mouth tugging up at the corner.

“Um, I uh, I’m here about the ad in the paper?” she stuttered through her answer, ending it like it was a question. She lifted the newspaper for a moment like he didn’t know what she meant by the word.

“What about it?” Bucky asked, just to tease. He didn’t expect her face to scrunch up even further in confusion. She blinked quickly a couple of times, her mouth open like she was going say something, but nothing came out. He took pity on her. “We haven’t put an ad in for over a year. How old is that paper?”

“Oh. Um, I don’t actually know. I just asked the homeless guy around the block if he had any job listings ‘cause he had a few papers stacked up by him,” she gestured around with the offending paper as she spoke, “I didn’t realize he’d have one this old. Didn’t even think to check.” She took a deep sigh, closing her eyes for a moment before pointing towards the shop’s front door. “I’m just gonna go. I’m sorry I bothered you.”

Bucky should’ve just let her walk out the door. Should’ve let her look for a job elsewhere. Should’ve let that be the last he saw of her.

He didn’t.

“Hey now!” he interrupted as she continued to mutter to herself as she walked towards the door. The girl spun back around to look at him. “I didn’t say we weren’t still looking for someone to hire.”

It was a lie. That ad had been a coded message to a partner of Bucky’s boss that was hiding from the feds. It had ridiculously little information in it, no one really looking for a job had shown up. Until now, that is.

“Oh. I just assumed…”

“Well that’s what you get for assuming,” Bucky chuckled, not unkindly, “Come sit and we’ll talk about it.” He rounded the counter, pushing up his sweater sleeves to his elbows.

“Well?” he asked after he had already taken a seat in at a table with two chairs and she still hadn’t moved from her spot by the door.

She shook her head a little, unable to help the smile that teased her lips, cheeks rosy, and joined him.

**********

“Hey Buck! How much longer on those croissants?” she called, craning her neck to look into the kitchen from her station behind the counter.

Bucky shook his head and grinned, “About two less minutes than the last time you asked, doll.”

“Sorry, babe,” she said sweetly, now standing on the other side of the cooling rack, meeting his eyes, “Brunch rush. You know how these ladies like their rolled bread.”

Bucky grinned and went back to kneading another batch of dough when she returned to her post, not before shooting him a wink.

She had begun working at the little bakery about four months earlier, just as the air started to turn chilly. Bucky had been in love with her nearly the entire time. He couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment he had started to fall, he guessed it was sometime around the twelfth time that one strand of hair fell in her face during the first half hour of their impromptu interview. He reached out and tucked it behind her ear, she looked up at him from underneath her eyelashes. His hand found its natural (rightful) place on her cheek when she slowly raised her head to look at him fully. They stayed like that for a moment, lost in each other’s eyes, before Sam cleared his throat from his place behind the counter. Two sets of cheeks turned pink and they attempted to laugh it off.

Bucky spent that afternoon composing the most persuasive email he had ever written, trying to convince his boss that hiring an outsider for a simple front counter position was a good idea. Lucky for him, Steve had taken a liking to him over the years and allowed it.

His world was different with her in it. She shown up at the exact right time, right when he felt like he was losing himself to this life. He had been undercover for six years, and if he was honest with himself, he barely remembered what it was like to feel something real. To not have to keep up with two mindsets and thought patterns. Constantly memorizing the details of his everyday life to report back every few months. It had been six months since they had found a way to get in touch with him. Six months of tiny details stored in his brain. He never knew what could be that one missing piece they needed to finally take down the crime ring.

But he had her now. His saving grace. She had come in with soft skin and even softer kisses, sweet smiles and a laugh that just felt like Christmas time. It reminded him of the lights show he had taken her to, where he finally had the nerve to tell her he loved her. They spent the spent the season grinning at each other over hot chocolates, squeezing their hands tight in the pocket of his leather jacket when he walked her home and pressing short pecks to her forehead, cheek, and lips, standing on her doorstep.

It was the first full week of January now. He had spent the past four first-week-of-the-months on high alert, open ears and an extra glock tucked in his boot. Steve had deliveries disguised as ingredients scheduled for this week, but they were never specific. They would show up when they thought it was safe for them to do so, or whenever they felt like it. Bucky had started taking extra precautions her first day on the job.

With the brunch rush was finally dwindling down, he pulled out the last batch of pastries from the oven and joined his girl at the counter. She smiled when she saw him coming, giving him a quick kiss over her shoulder as he passed by, headed for the display case with the fresh treats. She watched him as he carefully arranged each piece on the silver tray. Bucky dusted off his hands on his apron when he finished, meeting her gaze, emotions getting the best of him.

“My sweet girl,” he pulled her close, arms around her waist, “Soft and sweet.”

“Oh hush. Like you’re not the one turning soft,” she accuses with a grin, their noses bumping and brushing together. He tries to kiss her, he really does, but neither of them can seem to stop smiling long enough to do it properly.

“Only for you, my dear,” he singsonged before pressing a kiss to her forehead and pulling her against his chest, her head finding its home over his heart, her cold hands tucked between the two of them.

It was true, more than she knew, she made him soft. Bucky used to always have his jaw clenched, shoulders squared, fingers twitching, always ready to pull out his gun or fight off a threat at a moment’s notice. Now, he carefully tipped her chin back to press a short kiss to her soft lips. He wore his jacket that was a size and a half too big because he knew she’d end up in it with him by the end of the night, insisting he was warmer than her drink. He kept two helmets on his motorcycle. He made apple turnovers instead of cherry ones, because he knew she’d take home the leftovers and she preferred apple to cherry when the weather was cold.

He had gone soft around her, because he didn’t want her to see him hard. He didn’t want her to see him rough and brutal and unforgiving. He kept her away from everything to do with his undercover work. As far as she knew, he was just a guy who liked to bake and was close friends with the owner. And he would do anything it took to keep it that way.

Bucky hated lying to her, hated it more than anything else he did. Hated it more than the interrogations Steve had him handle. Hated it more than pulling guys off the street when they were headed home to their families. Hated it more than the steadily increasing number of kneecaps he had shattered or put holes through. Bucky hated lying to her. But the more knowledge she had, the more danger she was in, so he kept everything from her that he could.

But this was Bucky’s life, so of course that meant he couldn’t keep her out of harm’s way.

**********

It was a Tuesday morning when it happened.

He was in the kitchen, sliding a tray of cookies into the oven when he heard the bell above the front door chime. It wasn’t unusual at this time of day, they had the odd customer or two in the early hours. What was unusual and had his ears perking up, listening close, was her lack of greeting. She was always sure to give each customer a cheerful welcome when they came in, but there was a suspicious lack of sound coming from the front.

After a moment, Bucky called for her, “Doll?”, but he was met with more silence. He took a single step and the sound of the front bell met his ears again.

His feet gained speed before coming to a halt, his breath felt like it was knocked out of his chest as he took in the empty room. Everything exactly the way it should be, save for a missing girl and single white envelope sitting on the counter.

It glared at him from its resting place, unassuming.

He picked it up, hesitating a moment before unfolding it and read the cardstock note inside.

 

_**You’re late. You’ve got a rat. We took compensation.** _

 

Bucky felt his heart stutter, bile rising up in his throat. They thought Steve sold them out. They took her. Because of him.

_They took her because of me._

He felt his mind start to cave in on itself, and forced it to stop.

_Think, Barnes._

Gaining his sense back, Bucky raced into his office, rewinding the security tape to confirm his suspicions while dialing a number on his cell phone.

She picked up on the third ring. “James? What’s wrong?”

His chest felt so tight he didn’t know how he managed to get the words out. “They took her, Nat.”

Confusion mixed with worry in her tone, “Who took her James?”

“Rumlow took her, Nat,” his voice cracking as a grainy face flashed across the monitor. He held a pistol up, pointed directly at her face with one hand, while pressing a finger to his lips with the other.

He heard Natasha sigh on the end of the line, “James, you know we can’t do anything right now. You’re too deep under to pull and you don’t have enough for us to try and bust-”

“Romanoff, I couldn’t care less about that right now! They took her and I want to know if you’re going to help me get her back!” His voice was full of venom, a harshness that hadn’t been there in a while. It put a bad taste in his mouth to be back so forcefully, so quickly.

“I can’t make any promises, but what do you have in mind?”

**********

The dust had settled, the gun fire ceased, but still rung in his ears. He took a moment to count the bodies on the cement floor, some unconscious, some dead. He tried to convince himself that the fight was what caused his breathing to rattle his chest, not the fear of what he would find on the other side of the door in front of him.

Gun drawn, he kicked it in, wood splintering and scattering against the floor. Bucky took a calculated breath before stepping into the dim room. His eyes scanned the area to find only her body slumped in the corner, alone. He made his way to her, praying she was alive.

He knelt beside her, his hand coming up to brush her hair out of her face. “Doll?” He cupped her cheek, relieved it was still warm, before checking her pulse high on her neck. “Doll, can you hear me?”

“Bucky?”

A breath he didn’t realize he was holding left him like a sob as he quickly gathered her up in his arms, mindful of the bruises and swelling across her body. “Baby, I’m here. I’m so sorry. I’m right here.”

“Bucky, help me,” she begged, small hands clutching at his shirt, trying to pull herself closer to him.

“I’m right here. I’m here, you’re okay,” he attempted to reassure her, but he could see her fading back into unconsciousness, her head lolling to one side. “Doll, try to stay awake from me.”

He stood, pressing her to his chest, carrying her bridal style. “Buck, I’m so scared. Please help me.”

His heart shattered. “I’m here, baby.”

He was met with silence.

**********

He remembers being a kid, visiting some distant relative in the hospital. It was cold, the air smelled weird, and he had to be quiet. He couldn’t play with his toy car along the rails of the bed like he wanted to. There was a horribly annoying beeping coming from one of the machines too. He hated being at the hospital.

Ever since then, he’d always avoided hospitals. Would even change the channel if one of the characters on tv was hooked up to that awful machine.

But now, he couldn’t love that machine more. He had to stop himself from asking the nurse to turn up the volume. Because that contraption he had spent so long cursing, was the only thing telling him that she was still alive. The insistent beeping was in perfect rhythm with her heartbeat and as long the melody continued, he wasn’t really in any place to ask for more.

She had been asleep for two days now. The nurse said he shouldn’t worry. She had been through a lot. Her body was trying to process it and recover.

It didn’t really make him feel any better.

Eighteen hours. She had been away from him for eighteen hours before he finally found her. He had to loop Steve and Sam into what had happened as much as he could without giving himself away. He hated involving them in anything to do with her, but they needed to know why he was gone for so long. He didn’t need them getting suspicious. He’d made sure to let them know that Rumlow and the others were taken care of. Steve didn’t seem too upset that his allie was killed by one of his own. He was understanding and almost relieved. Even offered to take care of the mess for him. Bucky made up a lie that someone in a neighboring building had heard gun shots and the cops had arrived right after he had left, so there was nothing left for Steve to clean up. He would have to thank Natasha for that.

It was nearly six in the morning now. The sun was peeking over the horizon of buildings out the window. Bucky considered getting up and closing the blinds, but that would mean leaving his place by her side, curled up the ugly, vinyl covered chair that he’d pulled to sit at her bedside, his hand folded in her’s. Both the day and night nurse had attempted to convince him to go home and rest but he couldn’t fathom leaving her for even a moment, not after what he had put her through.

So Bucky just leaned back in his ridiculous chair, held her hand tight, and waited for her to come back to him.

He almost stops breathing when she squeezes his hand.

His voice is quiet and hopeful when he asks, “Doll?”

She hums and her brows furrow, “Buck?”

“Oh sweetheart,” he leans over her, thumb brushing against her cheek, “Baby I’m right here.”

She opens her eyes and he can see her remember what happened, watches the changes across her features. “Bucky, I- what happened?” Her hands come up to grip his arms, clutching him. He’s just as unwilling to let go.

“You’re okay, darling,” he tries to reassure her, smoothing her hair back, “What do you remember?”

She takes a shaking breath. “I remember him coming into the shop. He had a gun and he made me get in a van. There were more guys in the van. They took me somewhere, I don’t know, there weren’t windows and I lost count of how many turns there were, I’m sorry, I’m sorry Buck-“

“Hey, hey, hey, it’s okay. It’s not your fault. It’s okay, angel,” he did everything he could to comfort her, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Do you want to stop?”

She considered her options. If she quit now, she’d have to do it again later.

“No.” Her eyes had tears threatening to spill over the edges.

He moved to lay on the bed beside her, wrapping her in his arms. He gave her another kiss, this time on her temple and held her while he patiently waited for her gain the strength to continue.

“He kept asking me all these questions. I didn’t know he meant by any of it. He thought I was lying,” she said softly, her gaze trained on her left hand, covered in a cast. Memories flashed behind her eyes. “I was so scared, Bucky. I thought he was going to kill me. I was so confused and scared and all I could think of was you.”

He felt a pang in his chest. “Nothing and nobody can hurt you anymore,” he promised with everything within him. She tucked her face under his jaw, hiding herself away from the world.

He had to tell her.

“Doll, I need to tell you something,” he spoke as softly as he could, knowing that was a loaded sentence, especially at a moment like this.

“Okay,” she replied, just as soft. His soft girl.

“I’m an undercover agent,” he began, “Steve is a criminal, uses the bakery as a front for deliveries and shipments. The less you know the better, really. But those guys worked with Steve. They’re not his men or anything, but when they didn’t get their money in time, they went snooping and found out I’m an agent. That’s why they took you.”

He was quite for a moment, letting her absorb everything.

“I understand if you hate me and you don’t trust me, but I can’t let you out of my sight until I know you’re safe. If something happened to you… I don’t know what I’d do. But I won’t let it.”

“Bucky-“

“I can’t let anything happen to you-“

“Bucky-“

“I wouldn’t be able to live with myself-“

“Bucky!”

He finally looked down at her, eyes filled with tears, his voice about to break.

“You’re still my Bucky, right?”

He knew what she was asking. Was she, was what they had, just part of the mission? Or was it real?

“Of course,” he promised with absolute certainty.

“Then we’ll figure the rest out later. Right now though, just shut up and kiss me.”

And he did, desperately, because he almost lost the love of his life.

Laying there in the soft morning light, tears falling down two sets of cheeks, he whispered onto her lips, “I’ll never leave you alone. You and I, we’re safe.”

“Safe and sound,” she agreed, holding him tight.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Kudos and comments are deeply appreciated! You can check out more of my writing at puppy-bucky on tumblr :)


End file.
